On Wed, Jun 11, 2008 at 10:20 PM, Von Fugal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > <quote name="Alex Esplin" date="Wed, 11 Jun 2008 at 22:03 -0600"> >> My Honda Fit, which gets better mileage on the freeway than my old >> Civic did, gets significantly worse mileage around town. Why? >> Because it has less power. Less power == more effort to do the same >> amount of work. Stick anything on my car to increase it's power and >> my in-town mileage will go up (to a point) because it takes less >> effort to do the work. > > Freeway vs town mileage has several factors. Among which are stop/go and > power band. Drive your car 70 mph and note your rpms, then drive your > car again with the same rpms but in a lower gear, without stopping and > starting, and see if you get the same mileage (or slightly better due to > less air drag).
Should have made this more clear. Obviously in-town, stop and go driving produces lower mileage. I meant that the mileage hit is more for my Fit than it was for my Civic. Other than that, it appears that we are at least partially on the same page. I'm mainly trying to point out that boost does not mandate lesser efficiency, and in "mellow" driving conditions more power means less energy expended to produce the same result (cruising at 70, for example). The fact of the matter is that the internal combustion engine and powertrains we are familiar with are terribly inefficient, and anything we can do to increase that efficiency, even a few percent, is worth doing. -- Alex Esplin /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
